


A Sweet and Sour Halloween

by literaryempress



Series: Max and Isaac's Infinite Storybook [14]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Candy, Childhood, Childhood Memories, Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Family, Family Feels, Halloween, Holidays, Husbands, Kissing, M/M, Married Couple, Mild Sexual Content, Sibling Rivalry, Trick or Treating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-27 09:35:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8396641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/literaryempress/pseuds/literaryempress
Summary: Ian, Mickey, and the boys go to the North Side of Chicago for trick-or-treating this year.





	

“Give it back, Isaac.”

“No, it’s mine.”

“It was near the top of my basket.”

“No, it wasn’t.”

It usually went like that almost every time the Gallagher-Milkovich family went trick-or-treating on the North Side of Chicago. Max and Isaac always had sibling rivalries when it came to their candy, mostly because one had something the other didn’t have, or one had a piece of candy they didn’t like and wanted something different.

One year, Isaac had tripped and fell on the sidewalk and spilled most of his candy out of his Halloween basket. Ian, Mickey, and Max agreed to help him out, but it wasn’t until Isaac noticed Max taking some of the cherry-flavored Starburst candies for himself, Isaac pushed him away. That’s how this whole tradition of fighting over Halloween candy started, and since then, Ian and Mickey have had enough of it. This year, the two of them seemed to have gotten used to it, but that didn’t mean they didn’t want it to end.

Mickey was driving the car through the neighborhood. It was 7:25 p.m. They barely got to that many houses yet. Most of the candy in Max and Isaac’s baskets were either from the Halloween party held at their school, or from some of the neighbors in their neighborhood who had already set up for when the neighborhood kids started walking down the street with their parents for candy. Still, they had a lot - maybe not enough to satisfy them for the rest of the night, but they had some pretty big handfuls, if Ian and Mickey could say so themselves.

The car made a right turn down a one-way street where the houses were fully decorated with fake tombstones in the front lawns and fake cobwebs on the windows and doors. Isaac and Max continued to argue with each other as Mickey sought out a parking spot near the curb to his left.

“The lady from that house with the scarecrow in front of it gave it to me,” Max bickered to his brother. “She gave me the blue one. It’s mine.”

“She gave me a blue one, too.”

“Yours was orange.”

Ian’s head had been pounding since the two started arguing moments before. He swears he loves both of his boys from the bottom of his heart, but if he had to sit there and listen to the two of them fight over who had what box of Wonka Nerds, or who had the most Kit-Kats, he was going to lose it in this car in front of everyone.

“Aye,” Mickey called to the boys behind them, turning off the ignition once the car was parked evenly in its space. He turned around in his seat, and at the sight of Mickey’s frown on his face, both Max and Isaac were completely quiet. “I don’t want you two acting up when we go down this block, alright? The old man from the last neighborhood almost yelled at us for waking him up when he heard Max shouting to Isaac down the street.”

“Isaac stole my Snickers.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Well, why did you put your hand in my basket then?”

“Boys,” Mickey responded, his voice raising just a little bit. “That’s not the point. You guys need to behave, or else we’re not doing this again. Got it?” Max and Isaac hung their heads a little bit as they nodded. “I said, got it?”

“Yes, Dad,” Max answered first.

“Yeah, Dad,” Isaac responded.

“Good,” Mickey replied, reaching towards the black plastic bag sitting in front of Ian’s foot. “Max, I want you to empty your basket in this bag -”

“What?”

“And Isaac,” Mickey added, reaching for another bag to hand to Isaac, “put your candy in this one.”

Isaac frowned a little bit. “Dad, why do we have to empty our bags?”

“So you won’t be dropping shit on the sidewalk again like you both did before.”

“Mick,” Ian sighed, rubbing his hand over his face.

“I’m serious,” Mickey responded, raising his eyebrows at Ian. “It’ll teach them how to watch where they’re running the next time they try to catch a house that’s almost out of candy.” There was a brief silence as Mickey inhaled and exhaled for a second or so. Trick-or-treating will be the death of him one of these days, but at least his sons will be getting free candy every year, and Ian and Mickey will be saving money on buying Halloween candy for the house.

Max and Isaac poured all of their Halloween goodies in their respective plastic bags. As they did so, Mickey turned his head towards the giant, white house with the orange and red lights on the lawn. Their mailbox had a fake bat glued to the top of it, though it appeared to be pretty realistic in Isaac’s eyes anyway. There were a bunch of skulls on the grass in front of some fake tombstones, along with a vampire coffin placed perfectly in the middle, with a fake vampire laying flat on the inside. Mickey wondered if it would be one of those houses where shit pops up in the visitors’ faces. If that was the case, then Isaac would probably have a fit about it for the next couple of nights.

“Max, go with your brother to the front door and ring the bell,” Mickey told his eldest son. “Ian and I will be out there in a minute or two.” Max had just turned ten years old this past summer, so Mickey was fine with Max going up to a bell by himself, as long as Ian and Mickey were nearby in an event that someone walked up to them and did something suspicious.

The boys unbuckled their seat belts and climbed out of the car, taking their orange jack-o-lantern-shaped Halloween baskets with them, Max being careful in case a car was coming down the street. As the doors closed, and as Max and Isaac headed towards the first house, Mickey turned back around towards the back seat where the boys left their black plastic bags. He grabbed Isaac’s first and placed it on his lap, peeking inside the bag for anything suspicious that any of the previous houses may have slipped inside his stash.

“You’re checking the candy already?” Ian asked with a frown on his face. “I thought we were gonna do that when we get back home.”

“You know damn well those boys will hoard their goddamn candy in their rooms before we even get a chance to get a hold of it,” Mickey explained, shoving some of the Jolly Ranchers and Almond Joys out of the way inside Isaac’s bag. Mickey dug through the bag some more to find anything else dangerous or suspicious inside Isaac’s bag. So far, he came up empty-handed in terms of finding open wrappers, drugs, or weapons, but he managed to find a tiny, plastic bag of candy corn among the other pieces of candy Isaac got. With a scoff, Mickey spoke. “Fucking gross.”

“The fuck’s wrong with candy corn?”

Mickey rolled his eyes about halfway. “Of course your Carrot Top-lookin’ ass loves these pasty ass things.”

“They’re good, Mick. Try some.”

“No fucking way,” Mickey replied, “and this is my son’s fucking candy, man.”

“That didn’t stop you from sneaking some of those lemon-flavored shits out of Max’s stash last year.”

Mickey frowned. “What, Lemon Heads?” Ian nodded. “You got some fucked up preferences then, if you choose candy corn over Lemon Heads.”

“Those things are gross,” Ian commented. “I had to down a whole glass of Pepsi to get the taste out.”

“Fuck you, alright?” Mickey groaned as he heard Ian giggle in response. Mickey tossed Isaac’s bag back in his seat, keeping the tiny plastic bag of candy corn in his right hand to give to Ian. “But I’ll leave you to your crap corn, though, since you love kissing its ass all the time.”

“Hey,” Ian responded. “There’s no other ass I would love to kiss more than those.”

“If you say so.” Mickey groaned again as Ian leaned closer to him to give his husband a warm, wet kiss. The boys had to be waiting outside for them, if they hadn’t gone to the next house where some of the other neighborhood kids were. Judging by the sounds of Max calling to Isaac, telling him to hurry up so they could get to the next house, they should be fine for now, Mickey predicts, though he and Ian were going to have to get out of the car at some point before they got any further.

Ian had released their lips before he opened the plastic bag of candy corn, pouring one into the palm of his hand. “Come on, Mick. Try one.”

“No way. That stuff tastes like shit.”

“Will it still taste like shit if it’s on my tongue?” Ian asked, inching his eyebrow at Mickey as he put the piece of candy corn in his mouth.

“Even watching you eat it is repulsive.”

“Don’t you think you’re over-exaggerating a little bit?”

“Nope,” Mickey answered with a pop on the letter P.

Ian scoffed. “If you say so.”

“You fucking copying me now?” Mickey asked, staring into Ian’s eyes.

“Like you would get mad at your husband for sharing the same thoughts as you.” Mickey scoffed, and Ian giggled silently. After that, there was a silence between the two of them. Ian’s eyes were still glued to the side of Mickey’s face, that shit-eating grin plastered on his own face, and Mickey knew exactly what Ian was thinking.

Suddenly irked with the prolonged moment of silence, Mickey threw his head back against his car seat before he turned back around towards Ian. “Alright, you know what? Fine. Come over here and do it.” Somehow, the grin on Ian’s face grew even more to the point where he looked like the goddamn Cheshire Cat, and Mickey wanted to slap that look off Ian’s face so bad, because he always got a kick out of proving Mickey wrong, which Mickey externally despised yet secretly enjoyed.

Ian swallowed the one that was already in his mouth, so he grabbed another one out of the tiny, plastic bag for him and Mickey to share. Once it was on his tongue, Ian reached over towards his husband to give him another mouth-to-mouth kiss. This time, Mickey eagerly reciprocated, mainly because he would melt every time Ian’s tongue grazed over his own. Their lips melted together as one as they each devoured each other’s mouths. Mickey’s bottom lip had been caught inside Ian’s mouth, Ian’s teeth tugging on the flesh just a little bit, earning a moan out of the shorter man. Ian slowly let Mickey’s bottom lip go, and his mouth opened about a fraction against Mickey’s, gaining some oxygen as he dove into the kiss again. The candy corn was still against Ian’s tongue, and as he stuck his tongue inside his husband’s mouth, Mickey felt the candy corn drop against his tongue. The tiny piece of candy was very sweet, although it was also very soft and easily melted with the mixture of their warm saliva. The taste was a bit foreign to Mickey, though with the amount of persuasion Ian put into this whole idea, Mickey was willing to survive through it.

The two of them kisses each other on the lips one last time before Ian released the hold they had on each other. The candy corn was still in Mickey’s mouth, and Mickey took a moment to swish it around inside, trying to figure out if he even liked it or not. Judging by the look on his face, Ian could tell he wasn’t liking it very much, although he was trying to adjust to it. Ian couldn’t help but snicker a bit as his eyes stuck to the expression on Mickey’s face, and that alone caused Mickey to spit the candy corn out of his mouth.

“You find something fucking funny?”

“Nothing,” Ian responded, smiling in Mickey’s direction as if he’s the most innocent man on the planet.

All of a sudden, the two of them heard their sons shouting outside. It sounded as though Max and Isaac were racing each other around the neighborhood at this point, even though they just made it to the third house and were preparing to head to the fourth.

“We should probably follow them before someone’s pedophile-lookin’ uncle comes to swipe them away from us,” Mickey told Ian, unbuckling his seat belt and opening his door.

“No one’s fucking uncle wants to mess with a pirate and a prince with swords,” Ian responded, referring to Max and Isaac respectively. He unbuckled his own seat belt and climbed out of the car, stuffing the rest of the candy corn inside his pocket. The two men closed their doors, and Mickey waited for Ian to come onto the sidewalk before they held each other’s hands and strolled over to their kids. Mickey is very well aware of how dangerous it can get on Halloween night, so he’s very cautious when it comes to Max and Isaac. At the same time, he gets what Ian is saying. Max and Isaac are their boys, and no one’s gonna fuck with them if Ian and Mickey have anything to say about it.

“You got that right.”

* * *

One of the next houses the Gallagher-Milkovich family stopped by had to be one of Isaac and Max’s favorite houses. It had to be the best-decorated house in the whole neighborhood. Everything was brightly-lit on the lawn so people would be able to see where they’re going, and it attracted a bunch of children and their parents every year, especially with the brown and orange, light-up welcome sign near the sidewalk. The elderly woman who put up the display always sat near her front door with a few baskets of candy apples she prepared, along with some chocolate truffles and giant, sour candies in big, plastic bags. How she still managed to have so many treats left for everyone, no one really knew, though she did let everyone know that she had a couple of nephews who lived in Indiana, and they grew the apples she used for the candy apples, which somewhat explained the gigantic stash she had in her house.

Mickey drove the car into the parking space in front of the house, and once the ignition was turned off, Max immediately unbuckled his seat belt and climbed out of the car with his Halloween basket. Before he had a chance to run to the front porch, though, Ian poked his head out of the door and stopped him. “Max! You gotta empty your basket first!”

“I’m not gonna drop it.”  
  
“That’s what you said last year, buddy,” Mickey replied, climbing out of the car and closing the door behind him. He took a couple of steps towards Max and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Come on, before you miss the candy and shit at this house.”

“Dad -”

“You want me to drive us out of here then?” He didn’t know what parenting tactic always worked with children, but the moment Max heard that, he went back to the back seat of the car and dumped his candy inside his black bag.

Ian got out of the car and walked around the car until he got to Isaac’s door, helping the little guy out of his seat and getting his candy into his black bag. “You ready, buddy?”

“Yep,” Isaac responded, tossing the black bag on the floor in front of his seat, and Ian closed the door behind them before the two of them joined Mickey and Max on the sidewalk. Both of the boys ran up to the front door, while Ian and Mickey lingered behind and watched the boys join the other children up on the steps.

Ian chuckled as he watched Isaac greet the woman sitting down in her rocking chair by the front door. “Don’t you wish we were still fucking young enough to do this?” he asked Mickey, who turned his head a couple of degrees to his left so he could catch Ian in the corner of his eye.

“You’re acting like I did this shit often when I was Max’s age.”

Ian’s eyebrows shot up his forehead as he turned his head in Mickey’s direction. “You’ve never been trick-or-treating before?”

“I have, okay?” Mickey clarified. “I just...I’ve never been  _ often _ . There’s a difference.”

“How many times did you go?”

Mickey shrugged. “Twice.” He paused. “Three times? I don’t know, man.” There was a brief silence between the two of them. Mickey had glanced back over to Max and Isaac to see them talking to the woman handing out the candy and the candy apples, and then a few seconds later, he turned back towards Ian, noticing the shocked look on Ian’s face. “The fuck you lookin’ at?”

“You,” Ian answered almost immediately. “The hell do you mean you only went two or three times?”

“I’m a fucking Milkovich, Gallagher,” Mickey told him. “My Dad doesn’t even decorate for Christmas. Who do you think I am?”

To hear that made Ian feel a little sad. He’s gotten the opportunity to go trick-or-treating or participate in other holiday-related activities with his family, despite the mommy and daddy problems all of the Gallagher siblings have experienced, so little things like trick-or-treating was the norm for him. Finding out about Mickey’s traditions for the holidays - or the lack of - reminded Ian that not everyone has the chance to have fun like other people do.

“We still have some time before we have to take the boys back home,” Ian suggested. “We could snag us some candy, if we wanted.”

“Ian, we’re in our fucking thirties.”

“So? Who says Halloween has to be a kids thing? It can be for us, too.”

“Just -” Mickey stopped only to shake his head midway into the sentence. “I’m just not into it, man. Just forget it.” Ian’s heart sunk as he watched Mickey keep his eyes pointed in the direction of their sons in front of them, choosing not to turn and face Ian to touch on the issue any longer. Ian got how shitty Mickey’s childhood was for him, but Ian still wanted him to have the fun he could have gotten as a little boy. Terry was long out of their lives now, so Mickey had the freedom to do whatever he pleases. However, Mickey wasn’t choosing to take the opportunity to have at some of the fun things Max and Isaac were up to.

Max and Isaac were running back towards their fathers, their baskets filled with sour candy and chocolate, along with the candy apples the elderly woman prepared. Both Ian and Mickey could see the joy in their boys’ eyes as they discussed the elderly woman’s decorations on her lawn, the mini story she told all of the kids who walked up to her, and all of the treats she handed out to them. Ian had caught Mickey smile from the corner of his eye as Isaac showed him what was inside his Halloween basket. It was a small smile - it almost went unnoticed - but it was a smile nonetheless, and it had Ian thinking that a part of Mickey actually missed being a kid for once, though he was happy for the boys having the chance to be kids themselves.

It wasn’t fair, according to Ian. Mickey deserved some fun in his life, for he seemed to be the only person in the family who wasn’t having it. So he came up with a solution.

“Mick, go to the next house with Isaac,” Ian told his husband. “I wanna talk to Max.”

“Sure thing, man.” Mickey glanced down and met eyes with the raven-haired little boy next to him. “Move along, sport.” Isaac immediately started to dart towards the next house, and Mickey slowly strolled after him, leaving Ian and Max behind.

“What’s wrong, Dad?” Max asked, confused.

“Nothing’s wrong, buddy, actually.” Ian sighed before he turned his head around towards the elderly woman still at the front porch. A married couple had just left the front porch with their six-year-old daughter, dressed as a mermaid, and prepared to head over to the next block, leaving the elderly woman to count the remaining treats she had left to give out. A second or two later, Ian turned his head back around towards Max, and he asked, “Hey, why don’t you go back over there and ask her for a couple of more treats, huh? Tell them it’s for your dad.” Ian gestured towards Mickey, who was busy checking his phone to notice his husband looking in his direction. Max nodded to Ian and turned on his heel in the direction of the brightly-lit house, running back over to the front porch.

The elderly woman was putting out some more chocolate candy for her display when she noticed the same young boy dressed up in a black, white, and red pirate costume. She smiled as Max approached her. “Why, welcome back, young man,” she greeted him.

“Hi, Mrs. Guthrie.”

“Would you like some more candy?”

Max nodded. “And two candy apples, please. They’re for my two dads.”

“Coming right up.” The elderly woman told him, and she grabbed the basket full of sour candy to give to Max. “I still have some more apples in the house. It’ll only take a minute.” She stood up out of her chair and walked back inside the house, coming back out moments later with a new pile of candy apples. She took two of them outside of the basket to hand to Max, who placed everything in his basket and smiled back politely.

“Thank you, Mrs. Guthrie.”

“No problem, sweetheart,” she replied before Max walked away from her front porch and back over to Ian, who rubbed the top of his head over the giant, black pirate hat with the red feather on it. Ian glanced up towards the house for a moment and waved back at Mrs. Guthrie, who waved back at him before serving the new group of children right in front of her.

Ian and Max headed to the next house as quickly as they could, for Mickey and Isaac were already steps ahead of them, Isaac being very eager to reach every house in the neighborhood before they ran out of candy. Once Ian and Max caught up, and the Gallagher-Milkovich family made it to every house on the block, they returned to the car with the intention of getting to more houses before their Halloween night came to an end.

* * *

“Yo, Isaac,” Ian told his son as the seven-year-old was just about to sit on the couch with his bag of candy. “We discussed this, remember? Your dad and I have to check the candy first for open wrappers.”

“And other lethal bullshit these stuck-up North Siders might have slipped in your baskets,” Mickey responded with a certain amount of disgust to the thought of drugs being placed into Isaac’s basket. He walked over to Isaac and took the bag away, leaving the little boy to impatiently cross his arms and lean back on the couch. “Aye,” Mickey told him. “With an attitude like that, you won’t be getting this bag back. Understand me?” With that, Isaac nodded. “Good,” Mickey replied, picking up the remote from off the coffee table and turning on the TV. “Now you and Max watch  _ Charlie Brown _ or some shit while Dad and I come have a look at this.”

Ian took Max’s bag and his Halloween basket and brought it over to the dining room table where Mickey had already dumped Isaac’s Halloween candy on the table in front of him. Ian placed Max’s Halloween basket near the middle of the table, inching an eyebrow at Mickey as he scattered the candy out in front of him. “Don’t be too hard on him, Mick,” Ian whispered. “He’s a little boy; he has a lot to learn about this kind of stuff, and he won’t really understand it until he and Max get a little older.”

“Depends on whether or not the school or whatever will actually educate them on what kind of insane bullshit happens on Halloween night to little kids in prince costumes,” Mickey replied, his eyes suddenly falling onto the tiny, open box of orange-flavored Wonka Nerds towards his left. He picked it up with his right hand as he turned his head back around towards the couch. “Isaac!” The little boy turned around in his seat to meet eyes with his father. “Did you eat some of your candy in the car?”

“No.”

“Max?”

“No. He didn’t, Dad, and I didn’t, either.”

“Fuck,” Mickey muttered to himself as he threw the box down on the table, his other hand running through his jet black hair.

Ian shrugged. “It’s just a tiny box, Mick. We can get plenty of those at the story.”

“I guess.” Mickey continued to search through Isaac’s candy for anything dangerous or suspicious. Ian’s eyes were still on him for a couple of seconds before the redhead pulled out one of the candy apples from Max’s Halloween basket. When Mickey noticed something in front of him, he glanced up for a second and noticed Ian handing him a cherry red apple on a stick being pointed towards him. “The hell is that?”

“Max got it for you,” Ian answered. “He got one for me, too, but I wanted to give you yours first.” At the mention of his name, Max turned his head around and spotted Mickey extending his hand and grabbing the stick from Ian.

“He did?” Mickey asked Ian, looking down at the sweet treat he now had in front of him.

“Yeah, Dad,” Max called, and both Ian and Mickey turned their heads at the sound of his voice. “Dad said to get you one, and I got you other candy, too.” He climbed off the couch and joined the both of them at the table, standing closer to Mickey as the older man glanced between him and Ian and back. “He said he didn’t want you to not have any candy this year.”

Mickey now assumes that the whole childhood tradition thing seemed to have stuck with Ian throughout the whole trip and that Ian - and Max - wanted to make him feel better with some candy and a candy apple. He still feels too old to trick-or-treat like his sons get to, but the gesture was very generous of both Ian and Max, and he greatly appreciated it.

“Really?” Mickey asked both his husband and his oldest son, and they both nodded. A chuckle left Mickey’s mouth as he looked down at the candy apple in his hand. “Wow. Thanks a lot, sport,” Mickey told Max as he rubbed the top of his head and placed a kiss in Max’s red hair.

“Can we eat our candy apples now, Dad? Please?” Max asked both Ian and Mickey.

The two adults turned towards each other and smiled. Halloween was meant to be for the kids, and if Ian and Mickey were telling the honest truth, it still was for the kids. At the same time, Ian also wanted Halloween to be for Mickey as well. The treats from Mrs. Guthrie’s home wasn’t a lot to actually get Mickey in the Halloween mood, but it was a start.

Mickey didn’t really need a lot, to be honest. As long as his family’s having fun, he’s as content as can be.

“Sure. Why not?” Mickey replied, unwrapping his own candy apple. Ian grabbed one of the candy apples out of Max’s basket and handed it to Max while he went to grab his own and take the wrapping off. Isaac had walked over from the couch to grab his, and once they all had their apples, they maneuvered over to the couch, getting comfortable as the Charlie Brown Halloween special played on the widescreen television.

The rest of the night consisted of the four of them sharing Halloween candy and watching a bunch of Halloween movies, the boys still in their costumes but being careful as they dove into the chocolate candy. It was all the four of them really needed to have a fun rest of the evening.

**Author's Note:**

> Halloween is in four days, and I thought I would share this as a little gift for those who aren't doing much for Halloween this year. Whether you're trick-or-treating, going to parties, watching horror movies with friends, or just chilling at home, I hope you guys will have a wonderful day and night. Happy early Halloween, and happy reading. <3


End file.
